One police officer was critical in the moments after Ricky Pearsall was shot.
Pearsall, a rookie wide receiver whom the 49ers drafted in the first round this year, was shot in the chest by a 17-year-old during an attempted robbery in San Francisco on Saturday.
Sgt. Joelle Harrell from the San Francisco Police Department was nearby during the incident and sprinted to the scene after she heard gunshots, she told the San Francisco Chronicle.
She found Pearsall shirtless and covered in blood and quickly sprung into action.
Harrell instructed another officer to call an ambulance, according to the report, and began pressing Pearsall’s shirt into his wound in the front while pressing her cap into his wound in the back.
“I was using my hand for the front just to create a suction so the air wouldn’t enter the wound,” Harrell told the outlet.
Harrell also began asking Pearsall questions about the shooter and attempted to reassure the 23-year-old former Florida Gators star.
Pearsall had asked Harrell if he was going to die, she said.
The two began praying together until ambulances arrived.
“Be strong, like you’re on the field,” Harrell told Pearsall, her husband, Sgt. Frank Harrell told the paper.
The suspect spotted Pearsall, who had been shopping at Rimowa and Louis Vuitton in the city’s Union Square area, wearing an expensive watch as he was walking back to his Tesla.
Pearsall had been signing autographs in the afternoon before shopping.
The bullet “exited out his back” after entering his chest, according to Pearsall’s mother, Erin, but missed his vital organs.
Pearsall was released from the hospital on Sunday.
“He and his family, along with the entire San Francisco 49ers organization, would like to thank the San Francisco Police Department, emergency medical services, doctors and staff at San Francisco General Hospital,” the 49ers said in a statement Sunday.
